GlocalNet

Book two is done!!!!!! Now, all the editing, debating, and reformatting. It deals with globalization and what that looks like for how believers and the church engage the world. I feel this huge load off my mind. Finally, my wife is happy because I’ve moved all the books in my study at home back to my office at the church! Volumes have been stacked the last few months.  I’m A.D.D. and she tries hard to be quiet when I write at home, so now she can be as loud as she wants!!! Thanks, Nikki.

I’ve written to try to help people understand how we will engage the world in the future. I wish I could just get people reading Friedman, Prahalad, and about 15 others. The best books on leadership in the church about 20 years ago were leaders from the business world. The best missiologist are those writing on globalization. It’s a fantastic future, but uncertain. People won’t have the luxury of just stumbling into the future like they have in the past. They will have to be very, very intentional.

I watched Tom Brokaw interview President Musharaff on the news the other night. He told the President the West didn’t understand how Muslims could take their offense to the cartoons and become enraged by that, but not be enraged by the riots that were leaving other Muslims dead. The President told him, it was because it was blasphemy. The reputation of the Prophet being challenged was more serious than the rioting. In the West, God has become little more than a good luck charm--in other places, He’s the center of all.

It may be hard for us to understand in the West, but they really do believe God is at the center of everything. We say the same; however, often God is the person to make my dreams come true and work for me. To them, God is God. He is at the center of everything. He must be glorified. I loved what John Piper wrote last week about “the cross was a place of insult--has been and always will be--that’s what makes Jesus unique among belief.”

A few months ago I was with a Muslim King. We sat under a canopy in the hot African sun and spoke of humanity, God, brotherhood, and dozens of other things. The thing that stood out in my mind was when I asked him what mattered more to him than anything, his response was “The glory of God!” I would have thought that King had been reading John Piper! Had Piper given his talk on the glory of God and the centrality of who God was, he would have “amened” everything--until the cross.

Father--help me be able to take insults for you as a result of obedience and following you. Spirit--fill me so those times may be times of great joy and not sadness despite difficulty. Jesus--may I emulate You in how I live and exalt You in all I do.

I had the privilege of attending the National Prayer Breakfast for the President in D.C. last week. Bono spoke--and WOW! I believe he may be a modern day prophet. He wouldn’t call himself one and definitely wouldn’t be seen as such in the establishment, BUT, he sees things and captures something in what he says and does like no one else. “I hope God is with us in our villa’s in France. I don’t know for sure, but I hope He is.” He then lists all these things that we have as a wealthy country and wealthy people. Then, he says “I hope He’s with us, I don’t know He is, but I hope He is.” Then he says, “But one thing I know for sure, the Bible says, God is with the poor.”

He said he was cynical of church because one parent was Catholic and the other Protestant and all he saw as a child growing up in Ireland was how religion made people kill one another. He then saw the religious TV and viewed them as hucksters. He, then, was blown away at how we Americans keep asking God to bless us, and, yet, He has--the wealthiest people in the world. We are all rich.

He told us the US doesn’t even give 1% to the poor and then he challenged us to give another 1%--we could then touch the poor, the sick, etc. It was powerful and courageous. Rock on Bono--sing hard dude.

We don’t see miracles because we aren’t looking for them in the right places. We wait for the spectacular, the unexpected, the obvious--so that means that many people wouldn’t see them. BUT, I’m convinced miracles are seen in how God orchestrates things and how He is always connecting things. I can’t claim to be a Calvinist--I’m a 3.5 on a good day--sometimes a 4.0 if I’m really feeling good--and sometimes a 3.0 if I’m down. It wasn’t theology that started me in that drift--too many contradicting verses--too much reading of implications from both sides to build an airtight case either way. So what did it? Seeing God put people and circumstances together.

Last week, I was in Omaha and an incredible opportunity presented itself in a country. My job was to help the church determine its legitimacy, then help them connect. Three days later, I wound up meeting with the leader of a particular country that part of that project would involve. Accident? No way! I once heard David Wilkerson say a couple of years ago how is it that one person can sit on a pew and experience God so powerfully and another couldn’t. The answer, in reality, is who has the eyes to see and hear what God is doing and who is oblivious. Help us see God.

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